“What a scam! We signed up as a vendor to an October 2020 conference through conferenceseries.com in December 2019 and received no communication for months. Finally, after everything happened with Covid we found out that they had moved the conference that we were going to attend as a vendor to a webinar. We placed at least 10 phone calls and emails to them requesting a refund and have not had one response. They owe us $1599 and apparently have no intention of refunding us ever. I highly recommend staying away from this conference company as a vendor, participant or speaker based on the other reviews.”
“Here is the guy who own conference Series, Pulsus, Meeting International, lexis, LongDom and anymore.
https://www.facebook.com/drsrinubabu/
https://www.facebook.com/srinu.babu2”
“Stay away from ConferenceSeries by all means!!
It looks like a group of criminals that will take your registration money gladly, will never send a refund even when one is justified per their rules, will not answer phone calls or emails listed in their published contact details.”
“ConferenceSeries is a group of criminal fraudsters (usually with Indian background) who need to be rounded up and severely punished. Their assets should be seized to recompense the many, many, many who have been tricked.
Over 60 delegates were scammed by ConferenceSeries 3 days ago, all in the one conference venue in Melbourne, Australia - would you believe on opening day? The scam occurred across 2 fields of study - material science/nanotechnology and paediatric medicine held in 2 different rooms. This caused combined alarm and outrage. It is the first time I've seen a contingent of police and detectives called in by delegates to the one conference venue to investigate.
This is the MO of ConferenceSeries and other predatory conference scams like it:
1. There is no contact information for anyone in the ConferenceSeries organisation that is reliable or credible. There is no sponsor and no-one gets paid, including invited speakers. You will see overseas contact numbers and email addresses advertised on conference material which will not get you anywhere should you choose to reach out for trustworthy and reliable information.
2. Greatly exaggerated conference title eg 'World Congress something or other..' associated with very low, amateurish standard of conference amenity. Conference kits and information are disproportionately low quality to poor compared to the conference registration fee delegates have paid.
3. Attractive conference venue initially advertised, such as 5 star renowned and centrally located hotel chain/convention centre in a popular global city, desirable for tourists. This is the lure - the hook with the fat worm on it. This is the bait to entice you to pay the registration fee. At the ‘last minute’, typically a day or two before the scheduled conference start date, someone switches the venue to some low key, cheap out of the way place in the outskirts of the same city. No notification may be given to you of the venue change however if you do contact a ConferenceSeries member to complain about poor communication, they will tell you they tried contacting you through emails and made repeated phone calls to reach you about the venue change when they did nothing of the sort.
4. As a second lure, ConferenceSeries advertise a detailed conference lecture program online with fake grainy photos of fake international academic luminaries or misrepresented actual academic luminaries. These draw you in - once again to get you to pay the high registration fee because the 'United Nations' looking academia make it look legit and give it a sense of gravitas.
5 The registration fee is always in foreign currency limited to US dollars, British pounds or Euros. This fee is paid online via the Conference series website. Typically fees start from $599 USD, once again way out of proportion to the eventual poor standard of the actual conference. Do NOT pay it! As you are not going to be getting a 'world congress' as advertised but an informal village meeting.
6. Acknowledgement of payment is sent via email to record that you voluntarily handed over your payment ie. you weren't robbed. However, there are NO credible details of the conference organisation who has taken your money or the organiser on the receipt. You will have no idea where your money just went to.
7. The conference program advertised online can be filled with textbook loads of topics - the third lure. It will not fit into the time allotted for the lecture program over 2 days with 3 coffee breaks and lunch. Fake social media reviews might be attached praising the depth and peer reviewed rigour of conference material presented.
8. The ConferenceSeries conference is typically advertised to be held over 2 days however they only need duped delegates to turn up on Day 1, when a representative will take a picture of the bewildered group of delegates sitting down at their tables listening to the speaker (who BTW is a delegate who has been duped into thinking he/she is worthy to be the keynote speaker).
9. When you arrive for the conference, you can see a very modest amount of money has been outlaid by ConferenceSeries to book a cheaper, out of the way, semi-plausible venue. Needless to say the venue is nowhere near 'World Congress' standard. You will also find a little bit of money has been spent providing a laminated attendance certificate to assuage your growing anger. Also a conference ID lanyard and maybe a cheap useless brochure and paper show bag.
10. There is no conference introduction or welcome. Someone from the group will just get up and say 'Oh well since, I was asked to give a talk I'll be the first to start..' Ha, ha! On Day 2 of the ConferenceSeries conference, nobody shows up. It's finished. Scam job successfully completed. Have a good life.
11. Despite the online hype about 'International' or 'World' convention or conference, the number of delegates is usually limited to a modest number, say 40-50 people, to fit in a modest-sized room.
12. A ConferenceSeries staff member may use that discrete picture from Day 1's attendance to demonstrate the faux conference is not a scam at all to candidates who dare complain by email. 'Of course, it's not a scam. You see in the email attachment, there is a picture of people sitting down listening to a talk at the venue. Isn't that enough evidence that this is not a scam?'
13. No information about the conference coordinator or sponsor or any contact information about the conference organisers are given by ConferenceSeries in their emailed reply to your complaint. You may liaise briefly with a person with an English sounding pseudo name such as Saby Mathews, they will inform you that they will discuss with their 'higher authority' (Satan?) and will endeavour to 'get back to you as soon as possible' which unfortunately for you, means never.
In the end, delegates turn up to witness a farcical comedy of other conference delegates turning up to give talks to each other for gratis. Just like a local WhatsApp group, it costs nothing. Essentially speakers do not know they have been used and tricked already twice over - three times over if speakers have succumbed to earlier flattery about their professional eminence (when ConferenceSeries really don't know them from a bar of soap).
Original delegates who are tempted to become 'academic lecturers' by unashamed flattery from ConferenceSeries staff usually will receive an email or phone call about a month before the conference start date. Fatefully, they are tempted to also provide a photograph of themselves as well as an electronic signature for ConferenceSeries' online self-promotional use. For those who have offered their photo and their authentic signature, you will have no control of how these will be used again. Nor can you request that your signature or photo be withdrawn as it is now ConferenceSeries property.
ConferenceSeries also may embed a spy or a mole among the delegates (usually Indian ethnicity). That sham delegate will appear to others as just an ordinary fellow delegate or conference attendee. But his or her manner and demeanour is to 'facilitate' momentum in the group and report about the final outcome to 'head office'. That mole will seem a real people person - perhaps enthusiastic, congenial or encouraging or have some leadership quality among the group of otherwise lost-looking scammed delegates. In this way, some discussion and mileage is promoted by the mole as if to make the most of a scam situation. And of course, in the end, that mole provides a glowing online report about how great and worthwhile that particular scam conference was in contrast to the overwhelming negative reports from others.
In short, ConferenceSeries organisers/scammers enjoy a certain comedic satisfaction at the gullibility of professionals across a wide range of disciplines, in some situations playing on their professional vanity, their need to keep up to date in the 21st century, their desire to improve their CVs and a universal desire to travel to foreign places to escape usual daily work routine.
Medical and health care workers are fantastic targets as they are generally trusting souls who don't fight back much. Out of embarrassment or natural passivity, particularly with certain cultures and ethnicities, many deceived conference delegates are too embarrassed to complain and 'just don't want to cause trouble' - serving ConferenceSeries very well indeed.
ConferenceSeries perfectly understand that in good faith, individual hard-working people have taken time off weeks beforehand, paid hundreds of dollars for conference registration, thousands of dollars in organised travel and accommodation etc...but do they really care?
Of course they do, but in a roundabout way. They want your business again as a repeat customer, which is the reason why in the near future as more people complain it is likely the online presence of ConferenceSeries will gradually disappear....only to be resurrected in another form, one way or another, as an evil twin under a different name.
To use adjectives like 'predatory' or 'flaky' to describe ConferenceSeries and similar ilk, as some online reviewers do, is too kind. As is the term 'money-making' as per Beall et al. Such organisations as these should be branded as thieves, criminals and fraudsters who are to be arrested, publicly identified, fined and jailed with the cooperation of police resources from across the world.
I hope this review has been helpful to you so you can make a wise decision about joining a ConferenceSeries conference. I believe scammed delegates, as a force for good, should motivate Google, Facebook as well as other search engines and social media to completely and utterly wipe out Conference Series and OMICS from online and social media existence!”
“Fraud! no cancellation even more than 60 days before conference!
Exactly 62 days before the conference, on 5th of June my mother sent an email asking to cancel her registration to the 7-9 August Chromatography 2017 in Rome Italy, and informed that her Visa application was refused by the Italian embassy in Baghdad and asked for refund according to their policy which states full refund by cancelling 60 days before the day of the conference or earlier.
The company refused to refund her but less than half the amount paid which was 900 US dollar. They offered another conference next year but the visa application was again shamelessly refused by the Italian embassy deciding on behalf of Portugal in Baghdad.
My mother then contributed through a poster, but no refund of difference was made. The difference amounts to 400 USD. They even did not reply to several emails sent to their email addresses many months ago.”
